Stationary Doesn't Refer to Just Fancy Paper
by DaSwampRat'sCherie
Summary: "The kid was unnaturally still. Not quite what Phil had expected when Fury told him there was a belligerent twenty-year-old convict he was supposed to recruit for SHIELD." Story glosses over Clint's recruitment up to the timeline of the first Avengers, being more of a character study than plot-filled.


This is just a quick one-shot about a headcanon I developed so that I could feed my desire to have Clint be relentlessly fidgeting, and also feed my desire that he learned that not fidgeting is a good way to avoid being seen. And yes, I've been listening to Fall Out Boy of late hence my wacky titles.

Feedback such as favorites and reviews are loved.

**Disclaimer: Aw, Marvel, no**

* * *

The kid was still.

Unnaturally so.

He didn't _move_ a muscle, but he didn't look tense either. Not quite what Phil had expected when Fury told him there was a belligerent twenty-year-old convict he was supposed to recruit for SHIELD.

Even more curious, the kid managed to look like the perfect picture of relaxation, even shackled both to the table by his wrists and floor by his ankles. His shoulders were loose and his legs casually splayed out in front of him, yet when Phil narrowed his eyes he could note that not only was he utterly stationary, he also had a way of making himself appear smaller even all sprawled out like that.

Interesting.

Phil paused in the doorway, staring at the kid - he really should call him a young man, he mused, especially taking into account he'd been through more than most people Phil's age.

Barton just stared back, an easy grin on his face and a cavalier glint in his eye.

Phil closed the gap between them, pulling out the chair and sitting across from him all the while setting a file down on the table.

Even as he began the standard spiel - twisting it a bit to suit what he felt would be the kid's (young man's) tastes - Barton only bantered back. Smirked here and there.

But remained utterly still.

. . .

The first recruitment hadn't actually worked. Barton had turned him down and broken out not two weeks later, but the second one did. Might have had something to do with a feeling of obligation to the men who rescued you from being held captive and tortured for seventeen days.

Phil tried not to think about the rescue, or the state the then twenty-one-year-old was in.

Barton, unsurprisingly, had trouble adjusting. He was uncooperative and mouthy to his mentors; refused to take any form of aptitude test regarding his intelligence (they'd finally gotten around that one); didn't speak unless spoken to, or unless being sarcastic to the point of being caustic.

He was pretty much the textbook case for how _not _to act as a SHIELD junior agent (probably why Fury made Phil handle the kid.)

Eventually (and eventually really meant after a year and a half), though, Barton warmed up and became one of their most valued assets.

He was still cocky and rubbed people the wrong way simply because he could, but he'd settled.

The kid practically _lived_ in Phil's office when he wasn't on a mission, on the range, or sleeping. Which wasn't entirely true, because he took to sleeping on Phil's couch about 40% of the time. And when he wasn't sleeping, he was either perched (on the arm, on the backrest - didn't matter), or on his back staring at the ceiling and making comments about how the cracks in the plaster looked like dicks at the right angle.

But in the year and a half Phil had known him, he'd noticed that Barton was always, _always_ \- ..._still_.

Sometimes it worried him.

Being able to not fidget was valuable in a sniper, but it could be unnerving in every-day actions. It must have taken him years to hone in on the ability to not move, while still looking relaxed as opposed to tense.

It kind of baffled Phil, if he were honest, and he may or may not have begun paying extra careful attention to once - just _once_ \- see the kid twitch.

He didn't.

. . .

It wasn't until both he and Barton had been respectively promoted and now had basically every mission together that Phil finally caught it.

Phil was at his desk doing paperwork (like always) and Barton was perching on the couch (like always), when he caught some movement out of the corner of his eye.

Barton was rambling about the new wave of recruits that had come in - how irritating they were and surely he wasn't like that when he first came? (he was mostly worse) - and Phil glanced up to see what it was that was in his peripheral vision.

Barton was bobbing his knee. Not really in an anxious, or even annoyed, manner. Just an "I-have-too-much-energy" way, and Phil had to stop himself from staring.

He'd thought the lack of movement was disconcerting, but now that he'd grown used to it, this new display was throwing him off his game.

Phil carefully raised his eyes to Barton, studied his face for a solid thirty seconds before resolving that his agent didn't look upset (annoyed, yes, but not traumatized) and there were no other outward signs of anything being wrong.

Once Barton took a breath - some time later - Phil casually shot out, "Aside from annoying newbies, how's everything else? All right, I take it?"

"Golden."

His knee stopped bobbing.

. . .

It was funny, when Phil looked back, because over the course of time, that subtle knee-twitch paled in comparison to how fidgety Barton actually was.

Now, he was a flurry of motion - tapping his fingers, shaking his leg, throwing a ball up and down, _something_ to keep his body in motion.

And so he didn't think much about the whole thing because everyone had their quirks, and maybe Barton just had to grow into the energy he'd always had but didn't know what to do with.

It slipped his mind for months, until a particularly bad mission in Caracas hit and he reverted back to being motionless.

Within a week, he was back to his old self, but it still set Phil's radars off and had him scrambling to figure his agent out or go insane trying.

. . .

When Natasha came along (Barton _really_ needed to stop bringing home strays, and Phil _really_ needed to stop letting him), Phil noticed he became still again. And now that he thought about it, he only ever fidgeted when Phil was around.

He hadn't noticed it too much, because, as a rule, it was either just him and Barton anyway, or they were in some specific circumstance that either made Barton have to behave, or split Phil's attention away.

Now though, in close quarters, he noticed that he didn't move much at all around Natasha.

It only took three months for Phil to notice the discreet bouncing of his knee.

. . .

And this was how it went. Phil picked up on it - a solid four years too late, by his standards - and once he did, it all clicked.

Whenever Barton was uncomfortable, be it the situation or people he didn't fully trust nearby, he seemed to go stock still. Sometimes on his free days, Phil would contemplate that and had to link it back to the need to remain as invisible as possible to the abusive assholes Barton grew up with. Which only pissed him off and try to figure out how to either time travel or resurrect people from the dead just so he could kill them himself.

He noted Natasha had figured it out too - only took her six months by his guesstimation, probably less knowing the Widow - and she always seemed to pay extra attention to him when he didn't fidget.

It was nice to be counted in Barton's small circle of trust (that only seemed to consist of two people).

Which dropped to one when Phil died.

. . .

Natasha hated any form of weakness, and worrying - _worrying _over a _loved one_, no less - definitely counted as a weakness.

Clint was like a fucking statue these days, since they'd been talked into moving into the Tower.

He was still smiley, a little quieter the way he was around people he didn't know but was willing to banter; looked worn around the edges but surprisingly well-rested, ate stupidly but he always had (and she understood that too) so she didn't think much of it. But with all of those positive signs, he wasn't the wound up ball of energy he was supposed to be.

He just sat there (or stood there - whatever).

Stark noticed, and teased him every now and again for trying to be a gargoyle to attract his fellow bird people, and Clint smiled good-naturedly and huddled further into whatever he was perched on if possible, and the conversation moved on.

And she really hoped it was just the new environment, the unknown people.

But it was slowly killing her to see her partner - best friend - reverting back to the old mistrustful man she'd sparsely known but had Coulson (_Coulson_) tell her about.

. . .

Nat kept a closer eye on him, for obvious reasons, and the scary thing was he really did seem fine other than his weird-ass "not going to twitch" habit he stuck to. Even on the nights she'd craw into bed with him and they'd sleep together (just sleep, they'd matured passed doing more years ago), he seemed perfectly fine.

Still woke up from a nightmare here an there, but so did she so that didn't really count.

He was still reclusive (there was a reason she teased him for being a hermit though), and hid in the vents to watch more than he actually partook in anything team-related that she didn't strictly drag him to. She allowed him the vents, but she'd been considering calling him out on it and letting the rest of the guys know where he was for weeks.

Finally, she even asked him a gentle, "You good?"

He looked at her for a long moment, then nodded with a, "Yeah. I'm good."

She studied him, not saying a word, then offered a tiny nod and the two went back to eating.

He tried harder to go to team bonding stuff like movies and board games after that.

. . .

It was movie night - it was a weekly thing even though it was rare everyone could make it (without being interrupted by some impending world-doom).

She was curled up next to Clint, who took the end of the couch as always (he was a creature of habit in many aspects), Tony's foot sprawled out and just about on his lap.

The wealthy idiot only grinned and wiggled his toes when she commented on his magnificent ability to take up every inch of space.

It was a testament to her adjustment from living there for almost six months now that she only flipped him off, rather than flipping him over and pinning him to the ground like she considered.

Clint snorted beside her, and they shared a soft look that communicated more than words ever could.

Tony complained about their mind-reading abilities for the umpteenth time, but they both ignored him.

By the time they were half-way through, Bruce had fallen asleep and was snoring softly; Tony was trying to fling popcorn into Bruce's mouth; Steve was studiously watching the movie with a frown on his face, as if it held the answers to the universe.

It took until almost the end for her to realize that Clint's fingers were tapping across his thigh.


End file.
